Eating Your Words

2000 Words to Tease Your Taste Buds

Edited by William Grimes

Eating Your Words

2000 Words to Tease Your Taste Buds

Edited by William Grimes

Description

Here is a feast of words that will whet the appetite of food and word lovers everywhere. William Grimes, former restaurant critic for The New York Times, covers everything from bird's nest soup to Trockenbeerenauslese in this wonderfully informative food lexicon. Eating Your Words is a veritable cornucopia--a thousand-and-one entries on candies and desserts, fruits and vegetables, meats, seafood, spices, herbs, wines, cheeses, liqueurs, cocktails, sauces, dressings, and pastas. The book includes terms from around the world (basmati, kimchi, haggis, callaloo) and from around the block (meatloaf, slim jims, Philly cheesesteak). Grimes describes utensils (from tandoor and wok to slotted spoon and zester), cooking styles (a bonne femme, over easy), cuts of meat (crown roast, prime rib), and much more. Each definition includes a pronunciation guide and many entries indicate the origin of the word. Thus we learn that olla podrida is Spanish for 'rotten pot' and mulligatawny comes from the Tamil words milaku-tanni, meaning 'pepper water.' Grimes includes helpful tips on usage, such as when to write whiskey and when to write whisky. In addition, there are more than a dozen special sidebars on food and food word topics--everything from diner slang to bad fad diets--plus a time line of food trends by decade and a list of the best regional snack foods. Even if you don't know a summer sausage from a spring chicken, you will find Eating Your Words a delectable treat. And for everyone who loves to cook, this superb volume is an essential resource--and the perfect gift.

Eating Your Words

2000 Words to Tease Your Taste Buds

Edited by William Grimes

Author Information

William Grimes is a former restaurant reviewer for The New York Times and writes for the Time's Style and Arts sections. The author of My Fine Feathered Friend and Straight Up or On the Rocks: The Story of the American Cocktail, he lives in New York City.

Eating Your Words

2000 Words to Tease Your Taste Buds

Edited by William Grimes

Reviews and Awards

"Will whet the appetites of word lovers."--Chicago Tribune

"If you've ever floundered while decoding a sushi menu, puzzled over which sauce signifies what ingredients in classic French Cuisine or tried desperately to pronounce huitlacoche in a good Mexican restaurant, help is at hand.... Once fortified by this verbal batterie de cuisine you'll be able to roder huitlacoche, palacsinta, saganaki, and a salmagundi with confidence.... The culinary equivalent of a Berlitz phrase book, a handy reference of more than 2000 gastronomic terms and ingredients beginning with acorn squash and ending with zwieback."--Malachy Duffy, The New York Times Book Review

"Just the lexicon to make you a smarter diner and cook. But 'Eating Your Words' is more than a culinary dictionary. Here and there, Grimes breaks up the sections with essays, timelines and lists on such topics as mock foods and fad diets (the first was William the Conqueror's alcohol diet in 1087, followed by the first low-carb diet in the 1860s, the tapeworm diet in the 1920s and the blood-type diet in 1996, among many others)."--Sacramento Bee (Holiday Gift Book Roundup)